So you want to Own your Own Business…

The only reason to have your own business is so that you can do what you want to do, every day, until your last day.

It’s all about how you want to spend your time.

The three biggest challenges any entrepreneur faces are:

#1 Knowing what you want to do

#2 Knowing how to do that

#3 Probably the most important one, is why you want to do it.

The cliche that when you do what you love you never have to work a single day in your life is true when it comes to being a business owner.

Being a business owner is the toughest thing you will ever do in your life. When you follow a few basic principles, it becomes one of the most fulfilling things you will ever do in your life.

All Business Owners in all Industries Face the same Six “Pillars”, no Matter the Size of the Business:

Pillar 1 –
– Your vision, the picture you have for your business, and yourself sometime in the future.
– It is the reason you start and continue building your business.
– It is the reason why you stick it out when things are challenging. And things will be challenging. More than you want to believe and can imagine.

Pillar 2 –
– Your vision highlights the gaps between where you are now, and where you want to be.
– To close those gaps you need multiple plans, for example, marketing, sales, people, and of course money.
– Combined these plans form your strategy.

Pillar 3 –
– Plans must be executed.
– To execute plans requires you, staff, clients, suppliers, products/services, equipment, etc.

Pillar 4 –
– Executing plans requires time.
– Time is finite, it’s limited.
– There are 24 hours in every day. Nothing more, nothing less. And we all have the same amount of time.
– Not understanding your relationship with time, and not owning your time, will cause you misery.

Pillar 5 –
– Money.
– Next to fulfillment, this is why you build your business.
– It is what allows you to live the life you want.
– Remember, living the life you want is Pillar 1 – how you want to spend your time.
– What you must do to get that is build the best possible business you can. Then your business will give you the money to spend your time the way you want to.
– All people – the CEO and the Beggar – either spend their time getting money, or they spend their money spending their time. We never stop either.

Pillar 6 –
– Exit/Review.
– Pillar 1 never changes, but plans are never cast in stone.
– Life happens, so plans must be adapted, fine-tuned, exited, and re-drawn.
– When we don’t continuously review the execution of our plans, we don’t know if we are still on track with Pillar 1.
– When we don’t review, we fly blind.